Get the first words of Excel cells

• First word into another cell – Excel formula
• Keep ONLY the first word in the cell
• Get the First 2, 3, or N words
• Excel 365 formula
• Extract first N words in 2 clicks

That first word in a cell? It’s often the most important one. You might need to highlight it, capitalize it, move it elsewhere, or keep it front and center.

And sometimes it’s not just the first – you need the second word, the third, and beyond.

Need to remove the first words after grabbing them? That’s a different game – check out our dedicated article.

First word into another cell – Excel formula

What exactly is the first word? Simple – it’s everything before that initial space. To pull it out, use this formula:

=LEFT(A1,SEARCH(" ",A1&" ")-1)

Just replace A1 with your target cell.

See that clever “&” adding an extra space? That’s your safety net for single-word or empty cells. Without it, you’d get errors.

Drag this formula down a column and watch it automatically update as your data changes!

Keep ONLY the first word in the cell

Want to clean house and keep just the first word? Excel’s Find and Replace is your fastest friend.

Hit Ctrl + H and get ready to work some magic.

In “Find what”, type a space followed by an asterisk ( *). This wildcard means “everything after the first space.”

Leave “Replace with” completely empty. Click replace all and boom – everything after your first word vanishes!

Get the First 2, 3, or N words

Getting multiple words gets interesting. While Google Sheets has SPLIT, older Excel versions left us hanging.

No TEXTSPLIT? No problem. Use this formula for the first two words:

=LEFT(A1,SEARCH(UNICHAR(23456),SUBSTITUTE(A1&" "," ",UNICHAR(23456),2))-1)

Here’s the breakdown:

• SUBSTITUTE swaps the 2nd space with a unique character
• SEARCH locates that character’s position
• LEFT grabs everything before it

Want more words? Just change that number in SUBSTITUTE!

Using Excel 2013+? UNICHAR works great. For older versions, CHAR with a tab character saves the day:

=LEFT(A1;SEARCH(CHAR(9),SUBSTITUTE(A1&" "," ",CHAR(9),2))-1)

Excel 365 formula

If you’re rocking Excel 365, life just got beautiful with TEXTSPLIT and TEXTJOIN:

=TEXTJOIN(" ";TRUE;INDEX(TEXTSPLIT(A1;" ");SEQUENCE(N)))

Watch how it works:

1. TEXTSPLIT blows your text into individual words
2. SEQUENCE(N) generates numbers 1 through N
3. INDEX picks your first N words
4. TEXTJOIN stitches them back together, spaces included

Extract first N words in 2 clicks

Sure, knowing Excel formulas is great – and for true enthusiasts, I’ve built a massive Excel Functions Glossary. But let’s be real – complex formulas eat time, and remembering them all? Forget about it.

That’s why I built !SEMTools for Excel. “Extract first N words” procedure does the heavy lifting for you. Select your cells, choose how many words to grab, and get results instantly – either in the next column or replacing the originals. One simple checkbox controls it all.